HIV/AIDS still a major challenge in the region - CDC

Two senior officials at the United States Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have cautioned that the HIV/AIDS epidemic is still presenting major challenges across the Caribbean.



However, Director of the CDC’s Caribbean Regional Office, Dr Rachel Albalak, and the agency’s acting director of clinical services, Dr Jean Wysler Domercant, acknowledged that there has been significant progress in combating the epidemic across the region.



In a statement released today, the two CDC officials asserted that the Caribbean has higher HIV rates than any region outside of sub-Saharan Africa, but noted that the epidemic is relatively small.



According to them, the prevalence rates in the general population across the Caribbean range from a low of one per cent in Suriname to a high of 2.8 per cent in The Bahamas.



The two CDC officials say HIV affects young women up to three times more than young males in The Bahamas and Barbados but notes that more young males are affected in Jamaica, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.





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